At the classic Life Time Fitness/Toyota Cup Series stop at Minneapolis this weekend, the dominant race day favorites for the $12,500 men's and women's first prizes are Andy Potts and Sarah Haskins.

After all, Potts took second at the opening round in South Beach, won the CapTex Triathlon and the swim prime in Austin, and prevailed at the Philadelphia Triathlon to post a three-race points total of 30.5 – 4 points ahead of Cameron Dye’s 1-3-4 finishes (plus one half-point prime) and 26.5 points mark. In other prestigious races this season, Potts also won the Ironman 70.3 California and took his 4th Escape From Alcatraz victory.

In the women's contest, Toyota Cup series points leader Alicia Kaye has done well but doesn’t hold much of a chance on recent form against ITU star Sarah Haskins, who is third in series points. That's because Kaye accumulated her series-leading 25.5 points with a 4th and two 2nd places in three Toyota Cup races – which put her 3 points ahead of 2010 USA Triathlon Collegiate National Champion and new pro Nicole Kelleher. But Haskins scored a perfect 1st and 1st in her only two races in South Beach and CapTex.

Like Potts, Haskins has big performances in races outside the series. Haskins took her very first ITU World Cup win at Monterrey, Mexico. Haskins looks even tougher as the season goes on as she has largely recovered from a two-year bout with leg injuries.

In the Race to the Toyota Cup series points format, competitors must start a minimum of 3 of the 7 races – but can count their best five performances. What this means is that elite triathletes who choose to race all 7 events in the series have two throwaways. But competitors like Hunter Kemper, who took 2nd place at CapTex, has already used up his two throwaways and likely must have good results at Minneapolis plus the three remaining events at Chicago, Los Angeles and the series finale in Dallas.

Sticking with the Toyota Cup series all the way offers a very decent payoff – in addition to $12,500 top prizes at Minneapolis and Chicago and a $15,000 top payoff at Dallas, the men’s and women’s Toyota Cup season long points winners will take home a payoff of $62,500 – which includes the value of a Toyota Prius.

Looking simply at the Life Time Fitness round in Minneapolis – which pioneered big prize purse races in the USA starting in 2002 but has evolved into a more balanced series at prominent stops on the USA’s big-city, non-drafting, Olympic distance circuit – the men’s race looks to be Potts’ biggest challenge of the season. All-time greats like Greg Bennett, Hunter Kemper as well as rising star Andrew Yoder and former ITU star Filip Ospaly of the Czech Republic are shedding early season off-form cobwebs and have proven in the past they can go toe-to-toe with Potts even at his present red-hot best.

Case in point is Hunter Kemper. Kemper, who outran Potts to win the final US men’s Olympic slot in 2008 at Hy-Vee, is also coming back from two years of career-threatening sacroiliac injuries to achieve an odds-on chance to make his 4th Olympic team. That status was signaled by his World Cup win at Ishigaki, a win at the 5150 series event in Monroe Washington, and his performance amidst a swim-course chaos at CapTex. At that race, Potts escaped a bizarre interference from ill-informed and ill-trained water safety workers on jet skis who directed all of the leading elite men but Potts to an off course excursion that cost the field 2 minutes.

Closing fast with a race-best 10k, Kemper trailed Potts by a few seconds at the line and remained convinced that he would have won if not for the chaos. Seemingly validating that claim, Kemper, Dye and everyone else in the top 10 was awarded 1 more series point.

Still, as far as the Toyota Cup Series chase is concerned, Kemper remains a long shot as he cannot throw away any of the four remaining races. And this year his laser focus is aimed at a potentially winning his fourth US Olympic slot at London on August 6 – if he can beat the likes of Jarrod Shoemaker, Matt Chrabot and Greg Bennett.

In the women’s points chase, Haskins looks to be in control as another win at Minneapolis plus a good performance at the double-points paying finale in Dallas would lock up the Prius and all the cash and prestige that that goes with it.

Short of injury to Haskins throwing the Toyota Cup women’s points chase wide open, the most likely challenger is Rebeccah Wassner, who finished 3rd at South Beach and won at Philadelphia. After a stirring, career highlight Toyota Cup series victory last year, super-swimmer Sara McLarty has struggled to 7th and 8th place finishes in the Toyota Cup races at South Beach and Cap Tex so far and seems in need of a miracle to repeat.

The fourth round of the Slowtwitch live coverage of the Race to the Toyota Cup series gets underway on Saturday, July 9, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Slowtwitch will broadcast the race live (via text) just before the pro men start at 7:00 AM Central Daylight Time until conclusion roughly 2 hours later.